5 Best Ecommerce Platforms For Startups and Small Businesses

Gone are the days when you had to build your eCommerce site from scratch. Today, you can easily benefit from using platforms that are specifically for selling products and services without high cost and outrageous designs. As big eCommerce companies like Amazon are slowly cutting the margins of online sales and buying other startups, this is the best time to get your own store.

If you've been stressing about finding a developer, today your problem can be solved within days by using these platforms to get you started. You will be able to control all aspects of your store without leaving these platforms. From linking your warehouse inventory to drop-shipping apps, you can get help selling products with no inventory on hand.

You cannot think of creating a cost effective drop-shipping without Shopify or starting an online store for you products. It is one of the biggest and most famous online shopping platforms today. You will be joining over 400,000 entrepreneurs who use shopify to sell products every day.

If you are an entrepreneur or a small business that need to open a digital presence, the you don't have to wait anymore. You will always have 14 days to try out the Shopify before launching your store to the public. All you customer accounts are saved within your administrative account, this also includes; Sales, items sold, items pending, unlimited SKUs, access to app store, coupon codes and much more!

Why is Shopify good?

Based on your budget requirements, shopify can be the best option for you to get stared. You can easily choose from different packages $29 to $299/month and other packages like Shopify Plus. This includes access to free apps and other solutions to run your store without headaches.

One of the cleanest design platforms you'll find online. Sqaurespace launched in 2004 as a simple drag-and-drop website builder, and has grown to over 1 million users. When using this platform, you'll have the option of creating an online store or a service website with your unique pictures and flawless design.

Why is Sqaurespace good?

Use options like Paypal and strip to get your transactions completed securely. Lots of Sqaurespace templates are simple and ready for configuration before you go live online.

BigCommerce popular among small- to medium-sized stores that need a presence online. This platform offers many features to help small store owners grow their sales than almost any other shopping cart solution you'll find today.

Why is Magento good?

You can easily edit your HTML/CSS or other code with BigCommerce compared to other platforms but with way less options for store themes. Pricing starts at $29 - $199/month) and you can upgrade plans at anytime.

Magento is often considered the market leader among eCommerce platforms ever since it became popular. It's specifically recommended for its reliability and scalability for enterprise and medium to large companies, many popular brands you see online today mostly use Magento as the dominant technology for their online marketplace.

Why is Magento good?

With Magento, you will find the basic Community version is free, while the advanced Enterprise version costs a minimum of $20,000/year because of their focus on bigger companies with huge revenues. The Enterprise version of Magento offers many built in high-end features such as customer segmentation for easily matching preferences, 24/7 support and customer service with a few clicks.

Big Cartel launched in 2005 and is a much smaller platform compared to others in this space, but it is quickly growing in popularity among little community retail stores and craft stores. You can easily create your own t-shirt store, picture painting and many more creatives you'll like to sell to a targeted niche.

These eCommerce platforms or shopping carts are user friendly for everyone who has a spark of creativity, that why you see them on my list. You can have your online store up and running within hours not days from your initial setup, being that your get a plan right away. After signing up for any of these eCommerce platforms above, you can link your transaction payment gateway of your choice without any coding.

Remember, In case you want to kickstart your email marketing campaign to attract more potential customers, you might want to use tools like Drip, AWeber or Mailchimp to start sending out the word about your shop.

Now you are ready to get your store online, which platform will you consider?

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You have an online business and you still don't have a way of selling your products online and having your customers easily pay you. Then, you'll need to setup some eCommerce capabilities to get payment faster for your products.

Gone are the days when you had to build your eCommerce site from scratch. Today, you can easily benefit from using platforms that are specifically for selling products and services without high cost and outrageous designs. As big eCommerce companies like Amazon are slowly cutting the margins of online sales and buying other startups, this is the best time to get you own store.